Glasgow Boy, Cooks & Shouts Equally Well.

HELLO! Today I’ll be talking about pies. As usual Glasgow is behind the London curve when it comes to food and only now, 3 years after the Great London Pie Surge, are we jumping on the Pie band wagon.

That said every time I eat a pie I’m going to write about it.

Today’s pie is brought to you by the Libertine Bar, Bell St in Merchant City (unfortunately they didn’t pay for my pie, I bought it myself). On a side note, these guys ran a competition to name the bar with a prize of £1000 and the winner was Libertine? Really? It’s a rubbish name, we used to call it ‘Pub on the Corner’ – much better! Libertine is such a douche bag name. Ours was descriptive and vague just what you want in a pub name.

…putting the bad the name I will not be bias in my review.

Well it’s a rule of mine to go traditional when trying a new place or new range of dishes to the menu; if you can’t get the easy stuff right you should just give up! Right?

In saying that I wouldn’t ask The Libertine to give up! I quite enjoyed my steak pie. You can get mash or chips, I went for mash and a side of veg. Now, the pie wasn’t one of those pies which are meat and gravy encrusted within a savoury pastry. The pie comes in one of these…

…topped with a nice buttery puff pastry lid. The gravy was more of an onion based gravy rather than a beer or stout gravy. All and all it was tasty and I would recommend trying one at lunch, I say lunch because I think the portions are just right for lunch and maybe a little small for dinner. But don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying it wasn’t value for money. It was £6.95 for the pie which I think was pretty good.

…for some strange reason they don’t have a website so I can’t point you in their direction. Looks like you are actually going to need to go and see for yourself. If you’re not into pies or are with someone that isn’t into pies don’t worry they have more stuff on their menu veggie and meat. I’ve personally had a burger which was also very good.

Well. Disappointed, probably the most polite way to describe the way I’m feeling about Trattoria Gia on Kings Street. It looks the part from outside – wee quaint looking place from the outside and the same inside – very cosy.

Now, I found myself sniffing out a bit of lunch – specifically a take-away pizza. I used to get pizza from Dino’s when I worked up that end of town – I was looking for…you know, real pizza!

You can see in the kitchen from the restaurant, I couldn’t see an oven. I thought, odd, but maybe it’s in a hidden corner. WRONG! WRONG! There was no oven! How do you do pizza without an over? I ordered the pizza and the lady took my money and went into a room in the back. When she returned she had two pieces of cardboard, one box shaped and the other pizza shaped – F*&k! These culinary experts use a grill to cook pizza.

They sell pre-made pizza bases and grill them for the tidy price of £3.99. Total Robbery!

The fact that they’d bastardise a pizza leads me to one conclusion. They know nothing about food and don’t care about quality. It amazes me that businesses like this are able to stay open! If the owners read this – You need Gordon Ramsay in your life.

…on to the next one.

It’s just after lunch! I am satisfied. YUM! I didn’t bring any lunch today and I was huuuungry! Like a bear! Usually in a case like this I’d go to Dino’s and grab a pizza or pasta but I don’t work anywhere near there any more – I went on the hunt!

I walked in to town from Merchant city, considered DeVinci’s but just couldn’t do it. As I got back to Merchant City, assuming I’d be settling for a sandwich from Tesco, I remembered that Parnie St. used to have a few places on it. Success! Trans-Europe Cafe – a gourmet sandwich cafe! It was just what I wanted and it had the price/quality ratio for lunch! So. Really good and pretty cheap – NOM!

I got the Hamburg with bacon and cheese. The meat was seasoned correctly, not dry and not fatty. The bacon and cheese were not fatty or greasy either.

I recommend it, go now. Not just now, but right now!

Also, this is not a foot note, the chap working there was very friendly and the décor is pretty cool and comfy. I’d definitely head in the evenings or at the weekend.

Trans-Europe Cafe
Trans-Europe Cafe menu